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You think Mario would really know anything about baseball talent evaluation that would give him a better idea of who to hire? It's lightyears different than hockey evaluation. When we hired Huntington he had a pretty good track record, though he obviously hasn't done much worth a damn.

After 18 losing season I'd be willing to give anyone a try. Something has to change in that organization.

Who cares who the ownership is. All they have to do is hire managers who know what the hell they are doing. Obviously Bob Nutting has no clue what he is doing as an owner hiring management staff. It is time for something to change in the Pirates ball club from the top down.

Who cares who the ownership is. All they have to do is hire managers who know what the hell they are doing. Obviously Bob Nutting has no clue what he is doing as an owner hiring management staff. It is time for something to change in the Pirates ball club from the top down.

I think Nutting knows exactly what he is doing, he is making money hand over fist and MLB pays this team to lose. By doing so, it doesn't matter who he hires, he could hire Walter Matthua as manager and it wouldn't make a difference. They are only worried about making money and until this MLB changes they way they reward teams for failure the Pirates will continue to lose.

I think Nutting knows exactly what he is doing, he is making money hand over fist and MLB pays this team to lose. By doing so, it doesn't matter who he hires, he could hire Walter Matthua as manager and it wouldn't make a difference. They are only worried about making money and until this MLB changes they way they reward teams for failure the Pirates will continue to lose.

If you actually read the recent leaks they are not exactly making money hand over fist, 5 million profit is not a big number.

The reason we lose is we picked Bryan Bullington over Grenkie, Hamels, and Cain among others in just that draft alone. If you don't hit on the high picks you lose, its that simple.

"Racing doesn't teach a lesson. Nor do most racers. Many of them can't even tell you why they're in the cockpit. They don't know. Racing isn't what they do. It's who they are."

Actually that number is might seem small it is quite large considering that this team hasn't lost a dime in the past 9 years or so. The number would be larger if they would not be sinking so much money in the Dominican Republic, something that a lot of teams aren't doing right now. Which by the way is a great investment and will eventually yield some talent, the issue still remains that this team only has to play to the potential of 30th place in the league. As long as that happens MLB will continue to give money to the team.
In four years Andrew McCutchen will likely in at the end of his playing time with the Pirates and not close behind him will be players like Alvarez and Tabata. Texas has team payroll of 65 million dollars this season or pretty close to that and I heard today that this team might find itself in the dismantle mode following the playoffs. At least they got to the playoffs we haven't sniff the playoff race in many many years.
What needs to happen in baseball is for a cap to be put in place and for teams that don't spend up to that cap not to be compensated by the other teams for their business management woes.
If the current system stays in place then when a FA is who has played out his contract with a team like the Pirates the team picking up the player should be classified as A,B or C player. What I mean by that is this. If your an A player going into the FA market, the teams signing that player must compensate the former team a percentage of what that person signed for. Example, if McCutchen plays out his contract, goes on FA market and signs for 100/8 years (using that as an example for rounded numbers)---the teams signing a luxury tax of 20% would be paid, B-10% and C-5%....get rid of the annual kick back. What this does is two things, it makes the team developed better players so they do leave they sign contracts as A players, Tampa Bay's FA this year could fall into that category. It also forces the Pirates to invest in players like the Hamels who are coming out for the draft.
I hate that MLB makes other organizations pay the Pirates to play baseball. We are the only team that hasn't sniffed the playoff in 18 yrs. The city deserves more than what they are getting from the Pirates. We are nothing more that Welfare recipients in Section 8 housing.
One other thing about 5 Million profit, that number would also be higher if they didn't have freaking Fireworks Skyblasts ever other week and 75 other promotional nights to go along with it. We are the number one team in the MLB for offering out promotions. Check the teams that win, they don't give out crap all the time their promotion slogan is "We Win" come see a winner! I think more people would rather see a winner vs getting another magnet for the fridge!

I don't think you can be for a cap and against profit sharing, they both look to accomplish the same ends. Equal competitive financial footing. I am for both, the FA issues you talked about make the argument obvious. The reason I support profit sharing is you can't expect a team like San Diego or Florida to have sustained success with the Yankees pulling in the coin from their own TV station. The gap in liquid funds for things like the player academies are too great as it is. On the topic of the Pirates profit, don't you remember MLB forcing us to cut costs to pay down debt, essentially forcing the Ramirez to the Cubs? They had so much debt hanging over their heads it was ridiculous. The payroll number should be low considering we have no one worthy of a deal at the moment, I think a payroll around 75 would be the max for us and even that isn't sustainable. For a sustainable payroll I would say its in the mid 50's to low 60s.

"Racing doesn't teach a lesson. Nor do most racers. Many of them can't even tell you why they're in the cockpit. They don't know. Racing isn't what they do. It's who they are."